2009/ED/EFA/MRT/PI/03

Background paper prepared for the

Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2009

Overcoming Inequality: why governance matters

School-based Management in Latin America

Sergio Cárdenas
2008

This paper was commissioned by the Education for All Global Monitoring Report as
background information to assist in drafting the 2009 report. It has not been edited by the
team. The views and opinions expressed in this paper are those of the author(s) and should
not be attributed to the EFA Global Monitoring Report or to UNESCO. The papers can be
cited with the following reference: “Paper commissioned for the EFA Global Monitoring
Report 2009, Overcoming Inequality: why governance matters” For further information,
please contact efareport@unesco.org
School-based Management in Latin America

Sergio Cárdenas

Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas

2008

Abstract
 For several years, school-based management (SBM) has been a popular

model guiding the implementation of policies aimed at increasing efficiency of

educational systems in Latin America. Although evidence about how these

policies may have affected educational results is growing, little is known yet about

whether empowering school communities in developing countries may result in

the reproduction of educational inequalities and what components of SBM policies

should be carefully monitored during their implementation in marginalized

contexts. This paper describes some of the findings on both of these aspects as

reported by available literature, as well the main characteristics of some of SBM

policies that have been promoted in Latin American countries.

Introduction
The devolution of faculties to local governments and the redistribution of
responsibilities to schools and communities are examples of educational policies that
have been implemented in Latin America for several years. In the design of these
educational policies, school-based management (SBM) has become in several
occasions an accepted model to empower school actors and enhance parental
involvement in many countries, regardless of their specific characteristics such as
population, political organization, or institutional capacity.
School-based management has been usually identified as an intervention
aimed at improving efficiency in the operation of educational systems (Abu Duhou,
1999). Although some evidence regarding the impact of SBM has been provided,
little is still known about whether empowering school communities in developing
countries may result in the reproduction of educational inequalities. Therefore, it is
necessary to analyze the implementation of SBM programs in contexts like those
observed in Latin America, in order to shed light on the effects these programs may
have on the reproduction or eradication of unfair unequal conditions in educational
systems that operate in highly marginalized contexts.
This document will explore different ways through which SBM programs may
have resulted in additional challenges for policy makers. In particular, it will address
three research questions by analyzing aspects like the type of faculties transferred to
schools, the use of funds or grants by schools, or the characteristics of parental
involvement activities observed in several experiences in Latin America that have
already been studied. Thus, the research questions guiding the review of literature in
this paper are the following:
• Is school-based management associated with higher inclusion of
disadvantaged children? Under what conditions could this happen, if at all?
• Is school-based management associated with improved learning for
disadvantaged children? Under what conditions could this happen, if at all?
• What factors might compromise equitable access and learning outcomes
during implementation of school autonomy strategies?
Addressing these questions is relevant because in an ideal situation,
educational planners should not be concerned only about how SBM could result in
better educational results at the aggregate level, but also whether these
improvements and benefits are distributed fairly among all types of schools and
students. Identifying key procedures that may result in a reproduction of inequalities
during the implementation of SBM programs becomes then, a relevant aspect to be
addressed in order to better inform decision makers, public officials, and school
actors.
What are the key components and assumptions of the SBM model?
School-based management has been a popular model guiding the
implementation of educational reforms across the world for almost three decades
(Leithwood and Menzies, 1998; Caldwell, 2005; Di Gropello, 2006; Santibañez, 2006;
The World Bank, 2007). Several examples of educational policies based on this
model have been observed in numerous countries with diverse political and
organizational settings, corroborating that for several years, “school-based
management has been largely promoted as the major school reform for school
effectiveness” (Cheng, 1996, in Abu Duhou, 1999).
Policies considered as initiatives based on the school-based management
model (Park, 2000) usually promote concepts like increased school autonomy,
accountability, democratization, legitimacy, redistribution of decision power, and
participatory planning (David, 1990, in Abu Duhou 1999; Briggs and Wohlstetter,
2003; Caldwell, 2005). By using these concepts, promoters of the SBM model
articulate a key assumption of this model: that involvement of parents and
communities in decision-making processes at schools will result in increased
effectiveness (for some authors, only increased efficiency) in the operation of
educational systems.
It is clear that any SBM initiative entails a delegation or return of decision-
making power to schools. However, the faculties to be transferred and the locus of
decision-making power within schools differ enormously in the myriad of programs
labeled as school-based management, representing additional challenges to provide
a widely accepted definition of SBM.
Malen, Ogawa and Kranz (1990, in Park, 2000) provide a definition of SBM by
describing three of their main aspects. According to these authors, the
implementation of any school-based management program will represent a “formal
alteration of governance structures”, bearing in mind that this would be “a form of
decentralization that identifies the individual school as the primary unit of
improvement and relies on the redistribution of decision-making authority as the
primary means through which improvements might be stimulated and sustained”.
The decentralization process described by these authors will result in at least
two significant changes in how educational systems operate. First of all, it will
represent a delegation and distribution among “site level actors” of “some formal
authority to make decisions in the domains of budget, personnel and program”. In
second place, SBM will ideally embody the creation or reorganization of deliberative
structures at the school level, structures that will be “[...] often composed of
principals, teachers, parents, and at times, students and community residents [...]”
with the aim of involving “site participants [...] in school-wide decision-making”.
To further clarify the characteristics of SBM, it might be helpful to use Brown’s
classification of the six core strategies observed in SBM interventions (1990, in Abu
Duhou 1999). According to Brown, SBM initiatives usually rely on the promotion of
increased school autonomy, flexibility and responsiveness, the provision of conditions
where planning activities are considered a shared responsibility of school principals
and school communities, the encouragement for school principals to adopt new roles,
the creation of participatory environments in schools (“collaboration and collegiality
becomes an explicit goal”), and the existence of a greater sense of personal efficacy
for principals and teachers.
As the aspects pointed out by this author would suggest, the design and
implementation of school-based management interventions is supported, then, by
two theoretical assumptions, as has been reported by Bracho (2003). The first
assumption is that decentralization of decision-making power at the school level will
be the best way to achieve a more efficient allocation of resources (the closer the
decision-making process to the final “user”, the more efficient decisions are taken).
The second assumption is that the promotion of parents and schools communities’
involvement by central authorities will result in an increased political legitimacy,
assuming that recognizing the relevance of local actors will mean that educational
authorities are sensitive to local constituencies’ needs. In fact, the search for
increased efficiency and improved legitimacy may actually explain the popularity of
SBM in several developing countries, where concepts like these would be particularly
attractive for political actors typically concerned with the continuation of governance
and frequent scarcity of public resources.
 Variations in the design and implementation of educational policies based on
SBM are usually observed in two areas: the type of responsibilities delegated to the
schools and who the recipients of these responsibilities are. These two dimensions
will explain the main differences observed in interventions guided by the SBM model
analyzed in this study.
The first type of variations may be exemplified based on a description of SBM
initiatives implemented in Central America, presented by Di Gropello (2006). In the
case of Nicaragua, councils of schools participating in the “Autonomous School
Program” or ASP could make decisions on pedagogic issues, a situation that is not
observed in any of the other cases reported in the same study (El Salvador,
Guatemala and Honduras). This is a good example of the different approaches
observed in policies based on SBM, and also helps to explain variations in goals and
results, as well as some implications for equity issues. In addition, it illustrates the
disparities in responsibilities and capacities required to administer different SBM
initiatives at the school level: as expected, managing incentives systems or hiring
teachers will definitively demand different skills than controlling budget for school
maintenance or building classrooms.
A second source of variations between SBM initiatives is the designation of
school actors that will be responsible for the administration and implementation of
school improvement plans. On this aspect, Murphy and Beck (1995, in Leithwood
and Menzies, 1998) describe three different models or levels where decision-making
is allocated by SBM initiatives. In the first model, local administrators are responsible
for controlling the use of resources and for the planning process, in close
collaboration with principals and school communities. The second variation is that
administration of resources and guidance of planning processes is lead by teachers
(also known as “professional control SBM”). The idea behind this model is that
besides the efficiency created by closeness to the school, participation in the
decision-making process would increase the commitment of educational
professionals.
Finally, in the third model (also known as “community model”), school activities
and the allocation of resources must be decided according to parents’ preferences,
along with inputs provided by other actors from the school community. Although each
of these three types of SBM interventions will imply the delegation and organization
of different activities, in all of the cases, in order to be successful, school-based
management initiatives would require informed and continuous guidance by experts,
willingness from authorities to embrace and respect perspectives from actors at the
school level, and deep personal commitments to enhance school performance at any
level of the educational system, a combination of conditions that may not be easily
found in centralized and marginalized contexts.
A careful analysis of the different types of functions delegated to school
communities by SBM programs, as well as the locus of decision-making defined by
each program, would allow identifying the assumptions behind these initiatives as
well as predicting some of their likely results and possible shortcomings. For
instance, in some SBM programs that were analyzed in the available literature,
modifying instructional practices was considered as an explicit goal, but in the
delegation of faculties and resources provided to schools communities, there was a
disconnection between the stated goal and the tools provided to school principals
and teachers. In some cases, principals did not have any voice on the teacher hiring
or evaluation processes, on the adaptation of curriculums, or the promotion of
teachers and administrative staff, although they did enjoy freedom in the allocation of
resources for maintenance or construction of infrastructure. Moreover, decision-
making power about key aspects related to instructional practices was distributed
between different types of actors, thus representing additional challenges for the
administrators of SBM programs, given the lack of simplicity regarding who would be
accountable for certain decisions.
Mapping out variations in the strategies defined in SBM initiatives will help to
determine the array of possible effects that should be expected from this type of
interventions, what the main implications in the design of SBM evaluations could be,
and the type of activities and characteristics of schools that would assure a
successful implementation of SBM programs.
School-based management in LA
The decentralization of educational systems in Latin America during the
nineties resulted in the implementation of several SBM initiatives at different
government levels. Although most of the reported examples have been promoted by
national governments (e.g. EDUCO in El Salvador, or the Quality Schools Program in
Mexico), there have been a few examples implemented by provinces or state
governments that may also illustrate additional opportunities for empowering school
communities.
The following section presents some of the recent examples of SBM initiatives
implemented in Latin America, based on a search of electronic databases including
Academic Search Premier/EBSCO, ERIC/EBSCO, Education Abstracts/EBSCO,
Google Scholar, Proquest Dissertations & Theses, JSTOR, and Lexis-Nexis
Academic, as well as websites from national ministries of education in this region.
Argentina
The “Schools 2001” program, implemented by the Province of San Luis in
Argentina, encouraged the creation of “educational associations” to administer
schools that participated in this initiative. This program required the design and
implementation of school projects which should reflect the socioeconomic and
geographic conditions of the communities where schools were located, as well as
identify the pedagogical challenges and conditions of infrastructure in schools. Unlike
other SBM programs implemented in Latin America, school councils (or “educational
associations”) are not necessarily formed with members of the local community, but
educational experts or teachers from any region of the country, in the line of the
charter schools model (Feldfeber, Jaimovich and Saforcada, 2004).
An educational fund was provided to each of the participant schools in order to
cover operational expenses: teacher salaries (up to 85% of the fund provided),
infrastructure, educational materials, equipment, and professional development
activities. In addition, educational associations are accountable for school
performance, including students’ academic results.
This program was implemented in a limited number of schools, located in
neighborhoods with limited access to primary education. According to Feldfeber,
Jaimovich, and Saforcada (2004), the lack of community involvement and issues like
inadequate teacher hiring processes determined a limited expansion of this project. 1
No impact evaluation about this project was found.

1 Previous experiences in Argentina include the organization of school councils in 1988 in the province
of Buenos Aires, the “Escuelas Creativas” in Mendoza in the early 90’s (Gorostiaga and Pini, 2004)
and the “Nueva Escuela Argentina para el Siglo XXI” (Aguerrondo, Taddei and Lugo, n.d.).
Brazil
According to Santibañez (2006), SBM initiatives have been tested in “varying
forms and degrees” in Brazil since 1982. A relatively recent experience that has been
identified as SBM is the “Plano de Desenvolvimiento da Escola” or PDE, a program
that was created to facilitate the transformation of schools “from rigid and unfocused
bureaucracies to dynamic environments that maximize learning for all children”
(Amaral Sobrinho & de Almeida Neto (2001), in Carnoy et al., 2008).
PDE has been part of the “FUNDESCOLA Project”, a program launched in
1998 requesting schools to “identify their most serious problems and develop their
own plans for addressing these needs”, in order to obtain funds to implement their
school project (Carnoy, 2008). In addition, this program promoted the model of
“Escola Ativa" to improve the quality of instruction and learning in rural, multi-grade
schools (The World Bank, n.d.). An interesting aspect of the implementation of
FUNDESCOLA is that the activities promoted by this program have changed for
different cohorts of participant schools, particularly in the type of resources available
to schools. Indeed, this program has moved from the provision of school-based tools
in their first stages (including new instructional models) to “building the capacity of
local governments to support continuous improvement in schooling quality, and
promoting the financial, administrative, and managerial permanence of these reforms
through incentives and partnerships”, a shift that will presumably result in improved
school effectiveness given the support they will get from central educational
authorities.
As in other SBM experiences in Latin America, this program would purportedly
target rural and the neediest regions in Brazil (Schwartzman, 2005), but the effects of
this policy on the populations located in these regions have only been estimated very
recently (Santibañez, 2006). According to Carnoy et al. (2008), the “PDE resulted in
some improvements in management and learning materials, but little change in other
areas including evaluation and community relations.” These authors, however, “find
no evidence to show that participation in the PDE improved student achievement”,
although they identified “a positive relationship between PDE spending and student
gains, especially for spending on teaching and learning materials and furniture”.
Interestingly, they did not find a “benefit of electronics spending or spending on
teacher training, two of the three largest areas of investment” in PDE schools.
Ecuador
In the case of Ecuador, the “Redes Amigas” program included some of the
components associated with SBM. According to Ponce (2006), the main objective of
“Redes Amigas” is “to improve students’ cognitive achievement in the rural areas of
Ecuador through the decentralization of school management and community
participation”. Two particular aspects draw attention from the implementation of this
policy, when compared to other SBM initiatives in Latin America: that designers of
this policy considered as an explicit goal improving student achievement (at least in
its second implementation stage from 1999 to 2005); also, that resources for the
schools’ operation - though decentralized – have been administered by a “network
council” where teachers and parents of a group of “Redes Amigas” schools (12
schools on average) must make decisions about pedagogical issues and the use of
resources allocated to this network (in addition to teacher salaries) to be used in
professional development, educational materials, infrastructure, community
involvement and consulting services (Redes Amigas, n.d., in Ponce, 2006).
In order to participate in this program, schools should “be located in rural
areas”, “be registered at the Ministry of Education, as well as “apply to the program
and sign an agreement with the Ministry of Education” (Ponce, 2006). Regarding the
impact of this program, a quasi-experimental evaluation of “Redes Amigas” (Ponce,
2006) concluded that this program had an impact on student test scores, although no
effect was found in bilingual schools.
Guatemala
PRONADE or “Programa Nacional de Autogestión para el Desarrollo
Educativo” is a school-based management program with three basic objectives:
decentralize, increase community participation, and promote indigenous and
linguistic diversity (Di Gropello, 2006).
It is based on the operation of COEDUCA or “Comités Educativos”,
committees responsible for “paying school salaries, hiring, firing, monitoring and
evaluating staff, setting the school schedule and calendar, building and maintaining
school facilities, and providing budget oversight” (Santibañez, 2006). Although the
program was designed to “increase access in poor, rural, isolated areas” (Di
Gropello, 2006), in order to be eligible for PRONADE, communities must
demonstrate their ability and interest in managing a school, that no other school is
located nearby, and they must be able enroll at least 20 preschool and primary
school-age children.
About the impact of PRONADE, McEwan and Trowbridge (2007) point out that
“some evidence indicates that PRONADE schools provide greater time in the
classroom than standard public schools, and that rates of parental participation are
higher” (Anderson, 2003; Valerio and Rojas, 2003). Furthermore, a cost-effectiveness
analysis conducted by Schuh (2007), concludes that “based on the [completion rates
as] unit costs […], the cost per completer in PRONADE is approximately $1,245 per
student compared to $1,572 per student in the government schools. This difference
stems partially from the lower per student costs, but more significantly, from the
higher rate of completion in PRONADE schools”. Schuh’s finding may indeed confirm
results on internal efficiency reported in other evaluations of SBM experiences.
Haiti
Leroy (2002) describes that since 1995, the Minister of Education has
promoted the organization of “school-based management committees” to establish a
“formal partnership with the public and private stakeholders engaged in education”
and “democratize the work place, decentralize management, modernize the schools
and improve school-community relationships” (MENJ, 1995, in Leroy 2002).
Although it was assumed that schools would benefit from this decentralization
effort, according to this author, there were limited changes in the administration of
educational resources. Indeed, school principals “continued to have limited powers:
the curriculum is set by the central office, teachers may be nominated without their
consent, and the only funds they administer are a portion of the students’ modest
tuition” (Leroy, 2002). It has been reported, however, that in spite of the fact that
schools did not get the resources they should get, an increased parental involvement
in the operation of schools was determinant in improving the administration of
schools, given the “added support given by stakeholders” to school principals.
Honduras
In Honduras, the PROHECO or “Proyecto Hondureño de Educación
Comunitaria” is a school-based management program implemented with the goal of
“improv[ing] access to education and encourage community participation in
educational decision-making”, just like in other SBM programs observed in this
region.
 In this program, the participatory organization is known as “AECO” or
Asociación Educativa Comunitaria”, and it has the following faculties: “selecting and
paying teachers, monitoring teacher and student attendance and performance,
managing funds for school materials and school improvement activities, and building
and maintaining the school” (Di Gropello, 2006).
Two aspects should be pointed out when comparing PROHECO with similar
experiences: the existence of “social promoters”, an intermediate authority between
the district and the PROHECO schools who provides advice and training to the
schools, as well as establishing the selection criteria. Regarding their targeting
population, according to Di Gropello (2006), “communities qualify for a PROHECO
school if they meet the following criteria: (1) they are located in a rural area, (2) there
are at least 25 pre-school and primary-school age children, (3) the nearest school is
at least 3 kilometers away, and (4) the village is located in an area that was affected
by hurricane Mitch (Secretaría de Educación Pública, 2003).”
Jamaica
The Primary Education Support Project (launched in 2001), is a
comprehensive educational plan that includes 14 different subcomponents. This
project “aims to contribute to the improved performance, efficiency and equity of the
primary education system” in Jamaica, and includes the “Lighthouse Schools
Project”, a project where 12 schools across the country will pilot a “school-based
governance” model.
According to the Ministry of Education, “the Lighthouse Schools will empower
teacher participation in collaborative school leadership, site management,
instructional innovation, and decision-making”. Schools would be selected through “a
competitive process”, and would receive grants from the central government to
implement their plans, along with technical support and training “to build the teams,
review intervention strategies to aid the management and teaching/learning
processes and to develop community/parental links”.
There are two distinctive characteristics in this program. The first is that each
of the schools selected in the first cohort of Lighthouse Schools will be responsible
for replicating this model in five additional schools, and the second is the explicit
effort to document and disseminate the best practices observed in the
implementation of this project to other schools.
Mexico
Although previous experiences of decentralization at the school level in
Mexico have been implemented (Schmelkes, 2001; Gertler et al., 2005), the Quality
Schools Program (Programa Escuelas de Calidad, or PEC) can be considered the
most extended SBM initiative implemented in Mexico.
Among the original goals of this program was the promotion of participatory
planning at the school level, increasing community participation in the decision-
making process, reducing the administrative burden for participating schools, and
providing technical support to participating schools in order to improve their
performance. The PEC is based in four different types of interventions: provision of
school grants, support for increasing parental involvement, ongoing professional
development programs and continuous management support from central authorities.
The main assumption of PEC was that educational outcomes would improve if
organizational cultures within schools are changed, thus suggesting that schools
should enjoy more freedom to decide their own activities and priorities if any
improvement should be expected in an overwhelmingly centralized educational
system like the educational system in Mexico. The extended school freedom should
be complemented by an effort to involve different community actors, such as parents
and municipal authorities, whose collaboration in the definition of priorities would be
expected, as well as in the selection of possible solutions to the main problems
affecting the operation of their schools. Furthermore, this program was designed to
create incentives in order to increase monetary contributions from municipalities and
parents.
To participate in this program, principals from specific areas selected by
central authorities must submit school improvement plans (based on the contributions
and ideas from all school actors), and review these plans annually. These plans
should include a diagnosis and a list of possible actions that will address the most
severe problems observed in the operation of the school, and this will be evaluated
by a technical committee at the state level. If approved and selected in a competition
against similar schools, selected schools will get funds to implement their plans.
About the impact of this initiative, at least two studies have identified effects of
this program on dropout and failure rates (Skoufias and Shapiro, 2006), as well as in
dropout rates only (Murnane, Willet, and Cardenas, 2006).
Nicaragua
In the early 1990’s, Nicaragua implemented the “Autonomous Schools
Program” which aims to increase “community participation in educational
administration, obtain financial resources for schools beyond government funding,
and increase efficiency in the use of human and financial resources” (Parker, 2005, in
Santibañez, 2006).
Just like in similar programs, the delegation of responsibilities to school
councils included administrative functions like maintenance of school facilities, but
unlike other SBM initiatives implemented in this region, it also included a key aspect
in the administration of educational systems: the faculty of hiring or firing the school
principal (Santibañez, 2006).
There are three main aspects that should be pointed out regarding the target
population and, therefore, the characteristics of the beneficiaries of this program. In
first place, that this initiative started only with secondary schools, and included
primary schools later (Di Gropello, 2006). In second place, that until 2002
“autonomous schools could charge obligatory fees to parents” (Santibañez, 2006).
Finally, that it has two different operation models, rural and urban, a significant
difference from other SBM initiatives. In the case of urban schools, administration is
delegated at the school level, and in the case of rural schools, administration is
delegated at the municipal level, “where a centrally located school performs the
management functions and operates the bank accounts for the school cluster (King,
Özler, and Rawlings 2001; Fuller and Rivarola 1998)” (Di Gropello, 2006).
El Salvador
EDUCO is a prominent school-based management experience in Latin
America, followed as a model in the implementation of other decentralization
programs in countries of the region. It was designed with the aim of increasing
access to basic education by empowering communities in rural regions where
schools were inexistent or deficiently operated.
Since 1991, this program has relied in the operation of community educational
associations or “Asociaciones Comunales para la Educación” (ACE), as the
participatory organizations that deliver educational services in rural communities of El
Salvador.
 The type of activities usually delegated to schools in most of the SBM
initiatives implemented in the region (administration of school budget, school
maintenance, and acquisition of educational materials) are also responsibility of the
ACE’s (MOE, 2006). In addition, although an ACE has no responsibility over
pedagogical issues, it is responsible for hiring, monitoring, and firing teaching staff
(unlike experiences in other countries like Mexico), mainly because designers of this
program were trying to address the problem of “triangulation”, a situation usually
observed in centralized educational systems: although teachers work in a community,
they are hired and evaluated by central authorities, thus resulting in deficient
monitoring and the lack of community satisfaction, something usually ignored by
teachers (Meza, n.d.).
EDUCO has some features not observed in other SBM interventions in Latin
America, such as having among its goals the articulation of curriculums of preschool
and primary education, as well as improving health conditions of students (Meza,
n.d.), although recent information about results on these aspects has not been
published.
Furthermore, one specific intervention, the “special education classroom”,
indicates that this program is also focusing on addressing other issues of educational
inequalities, different to aspects of internal efficiency. An interesting aspect, however,
is that although applicant schools must be in rural regions and have a minimum of
potential students, communities still must apply voluntarily to be considered in this
program. Therefore, communities must already have some conditions in order to
operate EDUCO schools, and that might as well determine that the target population
might not be the neediest communities, but those organized enough to participate in
the application process. This is similar to other programs implemented in the region.
Impact of SBM initiatives in LA on learning and inclusion of students
Information about impact of school-based management programs is relatively
recent and still scarce, given that only a third generation of studies about school-
based management, “emerging in the late 1990’s and gathering momentum in the
early 2000’s, coincides with a pre-eminent concern for learning outcomes and the
development of a strong database” (Caldwell, 2005).
The lack of “research-based evidence of either direct or indirect effects of SBM
initiatives on students” pointed out a decade ago by Leithwood and Menzies (1998, in
Abu Duhou, 1999), has not been an obstacle for the expansion of SBM in recent
years (see Table One), although a recent interest on the evaluation of SBM initiatives
(The World Bank, 2007; Gertler et al. 2007) and the analysis of documented effects
(Santibañez, 2006; Di Gropello, 2006), may suggest that providing reliable empirical
evidence is essential to continue the sustainability and further expansion of SBM
initiatives in developing countries, as well as addressing questions about other
concerns like equity, perhaps suggesting the need for a fourth generation of studies,
considering Caldwell’s’ classification.
One of the main challenges regarding the impact evaluation of SBM initiatives
in Latin America, is that some of these programs were implemented under unusual
conditions, like in the case of the postwar setting in El Salvador or the devastation
due to Hurricane Mitch in Honduras (Gertler et al., 2007), where impact evaluations
might not be considered as a priority. In other cases, impact evaluation was simply
not considered in the design stages and the collection of relevant information in order
to estimate the overall impact and identify some of the mechanisms explaining effects
on outcomes, was delayed or plainly ignored.
Table One. Expansion of SBM programs (Adapted from Corrales, 2006)
Country Year Year
El Salvador 1991 2003
Number of Schools 236 2,047
Number of Students 8,416 362,880
Nicaragua 1994 2000
Number of Schools 915 4,165
Number of Students 300,771 653,346
Guatemala 1996 2003
Number of Schools 477 4,162
Number of Students 55,000 386,038
Honduras 1999 2003
Number of Schools 500 1,843
Number of Students 22,350 69,000
Mexico 2001 2003
Number of Schools 2,239 15,578
Number of Students 732,000 3,700,000
Initial year in each case reflects only availability of information.

Although there have been several creative and thoughtful efforts to overcome
the lack of reliable data and evaluate the impact of SBM interventions (Jimenez &
Sawada, 1998; Parker, 2005, in Di Gropello, 2006; Di Gropello, 2006; Skoufias and
Shapiro, 2006; Murnane et al. 2006; Ponce, 2006; Gertler, Patrinos and Rubio-
Codina,2005; Carnoy et al., 2008;), unfortunately in most of these studies, access to
evidence on issues like differentiated effects across populations or the adequacy of
targeting strategies (two key aspects necessary to reduce unfair educational
inequalities), has been limited.
A recent literature review conducted by Santibañez (2006) identified the
effects of the main SBM initiatives in Latin America (see table one). On her
comprehensive review, Santibañez finds that “SBM reforms, particularly in Central
America, have […] improved access and coverage in rural areas and poor
communities”.
In addition, she finds that “the empirical evidence for dropout and repetition
rates suggests SBM reforms do improve these” and that “evidence on student
achievement is mixed and in most cases, studies reporting increases or decreases in
this measure are using weaker designs. However, the few studies that use stronger
methodological strategies find […] very modest to no differences in test scores in El
Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua”. Additional findings on this matter suggest the
existence of positive effects in schools in Ecuador (Ponce, 2006), although the SBM
model implemented in that country includes regional management components and
these results should be examined by further studies.
A government report documenting 15 years of EDUCO experience (Ministerio
de Educación, 2006) provides additional information about students’ academic
results in EDUCO schools, and a different perspective about how performance of
SBM programs is evaluated by national governments. While comparing students’
academic performance across different types of schools in El Salvador, the authors
conclude that “the best 3,199 students in EDUCO schools are above 313,627
students” in the whole country on Language and Mathematics national test scores. 2
Although this information alone may indeed show that a small percentage of
students in some of the EDUCO schools can get academic results comparable to

2
Students ranked as “very high” in the performance level in national test scores.
other outstanding students in private and urban schools in El Salvador, it is
impossible to sort out school effects from the effects students’ individual
characteristics may produce. However, a closer look at the distribution of students
across performance levels (see figure one) shows that EDUCO schools have on
average a higher percentage of students in the lower performance levels (above the
national average) compared to other rural, urban and private schools. Although this
does not necessarily imply that EDUCO schools are not effective (the situation
described could in fact be the result of an effective targeting strategy), it is clear that
pedagogical challenges for this type of schools might be more complex than for the
rest of the Salvadoran schools.
Table Two. Evidence of SBM Effects on Student Outcomes (Santibañez, 2006)
Outcome Country SBM Impact
Overall finding: Positive impact
Access El Salvador Positive: Increased enrollments in rural and poor areas.
(increased Positive: Increased enrollments in rural areas.
enrollments) Honduras Positive: Increased enrollments in rural areas; increased
Guatemala attendance of Mayan girls.

Overall finding: Positive impact

El Salvador Positive: Increased continuation rates (reduced dropout) in
elementary schools (attributed to more community participation).
Mexico Positive: Participation in PEC reduced dropout rates and
Dropout and repetition rates; school participation in parental association
Repetition program reduced repetition and grade-failure rates.
Rates Honduras Positive: Modest effects in reducing dropout rates.
Nicaragua Positive: Increased promotion from having more de facto
autonomy in schools.
Brazil Positive: Participation in PDE improved grade-passing rates, but
no effects were found on dropout and attendance rates.
Student Overall finding: Mixed
Achievement El Salvador None: No differences between EDUCO and comparison schools
(EDUCO students come from more disadvantaged settings).
Honduras None to Positive: Modest positive effects on science test scores,
no effect on math or language.
Nicaragua
None to Positive: More autonomy over teacher-related issues is
 associated with higher student achievement in primary (math
and language) and secondary (language only) school; another
study found that it increased math achievement in some grades.
Brazil None: No statistical differences in Portuguese and Math scores
for PDE and non-PDE schools.
Guatemala None to Positive: One study found decreased achievement for
girls, but another found improved Spanish achievement and no
difference in mathematics between PRONADE and traditional
schools.
On the other hand, it could also be an expression of the success SBM
interventions have regarding inclusion and retention of students; in any case, the
results of this initiative should not be measured by looking at one group of students,
but to variations across time in the distribution of all students.
Figure One. A comparison of academic performance

Academic Performance
(National Test, 2005)

60

50

40
% of students

EDUCO
Rural
30 Urbano
Privado
Nacional
20

10

0
Very Low Low High Very High
Performance Level

Numerous explanations about the lack of additional evidence on the impact of

SBM interventions on student achievement could be explored (e.g. a scarcity of
studies due to the lack of reliable data, or the lack of experimental studies on this
issue), but it is important to indicate that in several cases, SBM reform designers in
Latin America have overlooked the implementation of strategies addressing
pedagogical issues (e.g. modifying or improving curriculums or their models to
improve instructional practices in order to favor disadvantaged students). Indeed,
although a common characteristic of the SBM interventions studied is the provision of
professional development activities, it has been reported that the principals’ focus is
frequently placed on responsibilities like administration of the budget or the
construction of facilities, rather than on the transformation of instructional practices in
their schools or the adaptation of educational plans to better support students.
In addition, more evidence is necessary about the existence of inequalities
associated to the implementation of school-based management initiatives in Latin
America. For instance, findings by Murnane et al. (2006) provide information about
unintended effects of SBM initiatives: in order to explore whether “the [varied]
capacity to undertake new roles” had resulted in variations of the Quality Schools
Program (PEC, for initials in Spanish) effectiveness across states, they classified
states into three different groups, based on their correspondent Human Development
Index (or HDI) values in the year 2000 (a weighted average of indices of child
survival rates, adult literacy rates, and per capita income). The results from the
estimation of PEC impact on dropout rates across the three groups of states (the only
outcome where any impact of PEC was previously found) showed that “participation
in PEC had its largest impact on states with middle values on the HDI [and] in
contrast, the impact of participation in PEC was initially smaller in the group of high
HDI states, but grew over the next two years. In sharpest contrast, the initial impact
of PEC on the low HDI states was negative, but over time became positive (although
the impact was not statistically significant in any of the three years of participation)”.
According to these authors, the lack of impact on the group of low HDI states
may be related to the lack of capacity among educational departments to provide
adequate support to PEC schools, thus suggesting that, at least in this case,
decentralization to schools was not sufficient to guarantee an impact. Therefore,
considering subsidiary interventions to address differences in institutional capacities
across local governments during the implementation of SBM initiatives should be
permanent, given that differences in the quality of support schools get from
educational authorities would presumably affect schools’ performance. Furthermore,
it is necessary to carefully analyze evidence of previous experiences regarding
focalization of programs, given the “Mathew effect” observed in the implementation of
PEC in Mexico, pointed out after identifying that “the first cohort of PEC schools
appear to be the schools with the most energetic school directors and/or teaching
staffs and parent communities” (Murnane, et al., 2006), a situation that certainly was
not considered in the early design stages of this program.
What are the main challenges for the implementation of SBM reforms in LA?
Although the simple idea of improving school effectiveness through the
decentralization and devolution of faculties to the schools, increasing parental
involvement and empowering school communities is very attractive, transforming
organizational cultures within schools, promoting a new type of leadership among
principals and central authorities, and most importantly, aligning the operation of
centralized systems to the needs of schools operating under new conditions is an
extremely difficult task (Abu Duhou, 1999).
It is important to keep in mind that initiatives based on school-based
management will pose new and important challenges for some of the school actors
like principals and teachers. It will represent additional workload (as has been
reported by Gamage and Sooksomchitra, 2004), additional pressure for principals
who will be working under expectations of developing a transformative leadership (a
difficult challenge even for experienced and well-trained professionals); even more,
as Wohlstetter and Odden (1992, in Cheng and Chan, 2000) have pointed out, in
SBM programs teachers and administrators must "possess a wide range of
knowledge and skills, namely content knowledge and skills in new instructional
strategies, planning and organizing meetings, following agendas, engaging in group
processes, budgeting, developing and monitoring a fiscal plan, as well as reviewing
and analyzing data on school performance", preconditions which demand complex
and permanent support from central authorities. Indeed, such necessity of knowledge
and particular skills will represents challenges not just in the organization of
professional development programs, but also for the attraction, promotion and
retention of teachers and administrators in any educational system promoting SBM
initiatives.
 Besides general findings and recommendations, in the reviewed literature, at
least five aspects and processes that may result in a reproduction of educational
inequalities in developing countries during the implementation of SBM programs were
found: A) Targeting and selection of schools; B) Variations in institutional capacity
across schools; C) Disproportionate focus on administration; D) Support from central
governments, and E) the evaluation process.
Targeting and selection of schools
An interesting tendency observed in Latin America is that target populations
for SBM interventions are initially defined by the location of schools (for instance
“rural regions”) or by reason of schools’ characteristics (“low performance schools”),
but principals or parents’ organizations in these schools must voluntarily apply to get
support from SBM programs. For instance, the regulation for the creation and
operation of community educational associations (Ministry of Education, n.d.)
establishes that in order to create an ACE in El Salvador, any community interested
in opening a school should organize and request in writing an authorization from
educational authorities. In Ecuador, schools “must be located in rural areas”, “be
registered at the Ministry of Education” and “apply to the program and sign an
agreement with the MOE”. In Mexico, in order to become a PEC school, principals
must be located in high poverty communities, formally “express their willingness to
become a PEC school”, and submit a school-improvement plan to a State
Participatory Council (SEP, 2008). Moreover, all the work involved in the preparation
for participation in a SBM program must be performed without salary incentives and
formally ignoring whether applications will be finally approved by central authorities.
Although voluntary participation of schools seems a reasonable and justifiable
decision, since SBM interventions depend upon the transformation of organizational
cultures (Fullan and Watson, 2000), an apparent tradeoff is that voluntary
participation of schools will likely result in a self-selection process where only schools
with committed principals and organized communities would apply for support.
On this issue, Bracho (2006, in Reimers and Cardenas, 2007), and Murnane
et al. (2006), provide evidence about how the targeting process in the PEC program
actually resulted in a selection of schools that were neither in the highest poverty
level nor in the lowest performance level.
 Figure two depicts the distribution of selected schools in five different cohorts
of PEC schools. As can be seen in this graphic, only 5% of the PEC selected schools
were among the poorest regions in the country in the first year of operation of this
program (school year 2001-2002). Almost five years later, after a notorious
expansion of the program, in the school year 2005-2006, only ten percent of the PEC
selected schools were situated in districts considered as extremely poor, even though
the regulation of the program had explicitly considered a priority inviting schools in
the marginalized regions of the country. Although this situation is gradually improving,
it seems that under the current allocation formula, PEC is actually targeting more
affluent and better organized schools among the poorest.
Figure Two. Percentage of PEC (QSP) schools by poverty level.

35%
QSP I QSP II QSP III QSP IV QSP V
0.29 0.33
30%

0.25
0.21
25%
0.22
0.20 0.20
20%

0.16
15%

0.10
10%

0.05
5%

0%
Very Low Low Medium High Very High

Adapted from Bracho, (2006), in Reimers and Cardenas, 2006

The issue of selection is also pointed out by Murnane, et al. (2006). According
to their estimates, “the progress of [PEC] schools [selected in the first year of
operation] in improving student outcomes was exceptional even in the pre-PEC years
and one could therefore only anticipate that they would have continued to be
 exceptional even had PEC not been created.” Therefore, it is clear that at least in the
first year of operation, PEC schools were not the schools with the worst performance
among the neediest, suggesting again that a careful focalization process should be
part of any design and implementation of a SBM initiative.
Figure 3. A comparison of performance on dropout rates, PEC and Non-PEC schools
(Murnane, et al. 2006)

4.9
4.8 4.74
D ro p o u t R a te

4.69 4.65
4.7
4.61 No-PEC
4.6
4.51
4.5 4.41
4.4 PEC

4.3
1998 1999 2000
Year

Inadequate targeting has also been one of the factors associated with the lack
of expansion of the “Escuelas 2001” program in Argentina (Feldfeber, Jaimovich and
Saforcada, 2004), suggesting as well that deficient targeting may also affect the
sustainability of any SBM intervention.
Variations in institutional capacity across schools
A second aspect to be considered as a challenge regarding the existence of
educational inequalities during the implementation of SBM programs is the natural
variation across schools in terms of the capabilities that parents, teachers, and
principals must have to benefit from SBM programs. This aspect raises concern
particularly because “many of the management-related decisions SBM reforms
involved – especially financing and staffing issues – are intricate and complex”
(Gertler et al., 2007). Furthermore, this aspect may partially explain the limited
parental involvement observed in disadvantaged schools participating in SBM
programs (Coleman, 1998 and Epstein et al., 1997, in Fullan and Watson, 2000).
 The lack of parental involvement may have serious consequences as well. As
it has been reported, lack of parental engagement in school activities may result in a
situation where “school committee[s] can become an instrument in the hands of an
elite group, and no increased transparency and accountability will be achieved”
(Gertler, et al. 2007), thus challenging one of the main assumptions of SBM
programs: that in a decentralized setting parents would be able to “influence and alter
school management and change the form of decision-making to favor students”
(World Bank, 2007).
The lack of technical capacity among teachers has also been reported as an
issue in schools implementing SBM initiatives. For instance, in a survey administered
to teachers and principals participating in PEC, 59 % of them considered that
“schools were not adequately organized to focus on student learning” and 31 %
considered that “teachers were not prepared to teach effectively” (Reimers and
Cardenas, 2006). Indeed, improving teachers’ skills seems to be one of the main
goals in several SBM programs (e.g. Brazil, Ecuador, or Mexico), although the limited
evidence available found no benefit of spending on teacher training, at least in the
case of Brazil (Carnoy, 2008).
Two examples would be useful in order to illustrate the significance of having
adequate institutional capacity at the school level, and the possible consequences
that erroneous decisions may have on the quality of instruction. In the case of El
Salvador, evidence provided by Sawada and Jimenez (1999) confirmed that EDUCO
schools hired teachers with less experience. Even though it is clear that selection of
teachers depends on several issues (e.g. salary levels or location of schools), the
fact is that ACE’s were more likely to hire teachers with less years of experience than
those teachers hired for comparable schools. Given that evidence suggests that
under certain conditions teaching experience can be a predictor of teaching quality
(Hanushek et al., 2005), a question to be addressed is whether parents’ decisions
regarding hiring of teachers would result in a diminished school effectiveness.
An additional example is provided by Reimers and Cardenas (2006), who
point out that “the poorest urban schools allocate funds for professional development
programs in a range close to the maximum amount allowed for this type of activities
in the first years of the program, about 20%. In comparison, the poorest rural schools
invest almost 10 times less than urban schools with one year of participation in PEC,
8 times less than urban schools in the case of schools in their second year in PEC,
almost 3 times less than urban schools in the case of schools with 4 years of
participation in PEC and almost 4 times less than urban schools in the case of
schools with 4 years of participation in the program.” (See Table Three).

Table three. A comparison of spending decisions between rural and urban

schools (from Reimers and Cardenas, 2006)
One year in the program
Type Poverty level
of school Very low Low Medium High Very High
Urban 4.64 % 5.83 % 5.41 % 5.26 % 13.53 %
Rural 5.45 % 4.42 % 4.46 % 3.03 % 1.6 %
Two years in the program
Type Poverty level
of school Very low Low Medium High Very High
Urban 5.34 % 4.76 % 7.18 % 4.47 % 16.47 %
Rural 4.18 % 4.06 % 7.33 % 4.72 % 2.44 %
Three years in the program
Type Poverty level
of school Very low Low Medium High Very High
Urban 10.62 % 6.89 % 5.00 % 7.31 % 13.95 %
Rural 1.06 % 3.98 % 4.56 % 4.71 % 4.28 %
Four years in the program
Type Poverty level
of school Very low Low Medium High Very High
Urban 9.91 % 7.37 % 6.77 % 10.17 % 16.9 %
Rural 9.24 % 5.59 % 9.22 % 5.03 % 3.87 %

Just like in the previous example, several reasons may explain these
decisions, but given the challenges schools in marginalized rural regions usually
face, investment in professional development could be a reasonable decision in order
to improve instructional practices.
Disproportionate focus on administration
A list of responsibilities and functions delegated to schools in SBM programs
in Central America (Di Gropello, 2006), serves to exemplify an omission observed in
the implementation of most of the SBM initiatives in Latin America. As can be seen in
Table four, SBM initiatives have focused on issues of control and monitoring
(personnel management, budget and maintenance), with the relative exception of
Guatemala. This could result in a limited delegation of faculties to schools on
pedagogic aspects like adapting curriculums or modifying instructional practices.
Although this condition has been observed in other decentralization efforts, ignoring
pedagogical aspects in SBM programs may result in spending resources “without
having any discernible effect on what students actually learn” (Elmore, 1993).
One of the possible arguments against empowering schools to address
pedagogical issues is that schools may lack the relevant expertise. However, this
could indeed contradict one of the main assumptions of SBM interventions: that
decentralization would “provide a better tailored delivery of services given that it
minimizes information asymmetries”. Indeed, it may also result in providing limited
support in one of the areas school communities identify as a key aspect for the
successful implementation of their projects, given the available evidence that
suggests that teachers and principals in schools participating in SBM programs are
aware of the necessity to address pedagogical issues, as Carnoy (2008) has
observed in Brazil. 3
An additional aspect to be pointed out regarding the delegation of
disproportionate administrative functions to principals in participant schools, is that
“SBM has in several cases made life harder for school principals by increasing their
administrative and managerial workload, to the detriment of their role as a
pedagogical leader (Caldwell 1993; Odden and Odden 1994; Wylie 1996) (Gertler et
al., 2007)”.
Table four. Decentralized functions (adapted from Di Gropello, 2006)
Council Functions EDUCO PRONADE PROHECO ASP QSP
El Salvador Guatemala Honduras Nicaragua Mexico
Personnel Management

3
“In order to improve teaching and learning, teachers and administrators point to the need to organize
and integrate their curriculum, to improve teaching, and to continuously evaluate students.” (Carnoy
2008).
Paying Staff Salaries * * * *
Establishing incentives for
*
teaching staff
Hiring/firing teaching staff * * * *
Supervising and evaluating
* * * *
teachers
Hiring/firing administrative staff *
Pedagogy
Setting classrooms hours by
*
subject
Selecting some textbooks *
School calendar * *
Maintenance and Infrastructure
Building/maintaining school * * * * *
Buying school material * * * * *
Budget
Budget oversight * * * *
Budget allocation * *
Establishing school fees *
This situation is confirmed also by Malen (1990, in Leroy, 2002), who points
out that “principals get exhausted by the demands of participatory processes and are
frustrated with the struggle to retain control over issues perceived to fall within their
purview”. In addition, Meza (n.d.) has also pointed out that in El Salvador,
administrative procedures usually overwhelm teachers and parents, suggesting that
improvements should be made at the central level in order to systematize and
improve monitoring and control procedures.
Support from central governments
According to Leroy (2002), teachers, parents and principals in schools
implementing a SBM program in Haiti considered that central authorities were “not
doing enough to support [their] schools”. Furthermore, from their perspective,
“democratization and empowerment of [school] communities went [...] without the
backing of the central office in terms of technical support”.
Providing adequate support to schools is one of the key aspects in the
implementation of SBM programs, given the necessity for improving the capacity of
parents, teachers, and principals to administer funds, design school plans, increase
accountability, and promote community participation. As Fullan and Watson (2000)
point out, central authorities should realize “that SBM decidedly does not mean
leaving decentralized schools and communities on their own”. Indeed, as this author
suggests, an “external infrastructure” is required to promote capacity building that is
necessary for a successful implementation of SBM reforms.
Establishing an “external infrastructure” represents, then, starting a profound
transformation in the organization of central offices, as well as designing and
implementing efficient monitoring and support systems, considering each school’s
particular needs. Although some positive aspects on this matter have been observed
(Murnane, et al., 2006; Ponce, 2006), a review of the implementation strategies in
Latin America reveals, for instance, that standards for central educational authorities
operating SBM interventions are frequently missing, thus providing limited information
to schools about the interventions central authorities will carry out, in order to support
them during the implementation of their school projects.
Elaboration of school plans and performance agreements by applicant schools
must be linked to the definition and publicity of standards and obligations of
educational central authorities, so that they will be adequately supported. Indeed,
programs like FUNDESCOLA in Brazil have acknowledged the importance of
adapting the participation of central governments, and in recent plans have accepted
“building the capacity of local governments to support continuous improvement in
schooling quality, and promoting the financial, administrative, and managerial
permanence of these reforms” as one of their main strategies, suggesting that
perhaps these activities must be considered from the early design stages of any SBM
initiative to be implemented in this region.
Evaluation process
A common point raised in the studies about school-based management
experiences in Latin America is the limited number of impact evaluations of SBM
interventions. In fact, in a recent document, Gertler, Patrinos and Rubio-Codina
(2007) point out the relevance of conducting solid evaluations of SBM programs while
developing programs, suggesting “six outstanding issues” to be considered in the
design of these evaluations. Out of these issues, two of them seem particularly
relevant for the identification of factors that might compromise equitable access to
learning outcomes during the implementation of SBM programs.
The first relevant issue is the lack of “process evaluations”, or evaluations that
“decompose the SBM intervention into its different components (autonomy to hire
and fire teachers, control over resources, autonomy over school planning and
instruction, etc.) and attempt to identify the effects of each sub-component
separately”, unlike program evaluations that “measure the overall impact of
interventions” considering SBM reforms as black boxes.
Although the lack of information about the effects of SBM reforms represents a
barrier to improving the design of educational policies, the fact that little is known
about which specific component of SBM reforms may impact the performance of
schools restricts the possibility of adapting SBM programs to the particular needs of
disadvantaged schools and children. Although no “silver bullets” exist, and SBM
reforms are known for being demanding to disadvantaged schools, identifying the
effects that specific components of SBM reforms have on school performance would
open opportunities to adapt SBM models to different school conditions, therefore
increasing the effectiveness to reduce or diminish gaps between schools in any
system.
Another relevant issue, closely related to the lack of “process evaluations” is
that “more attention should be paid to the potential for increasing schooling
inequalities as a result of the implementation of SBM reforms”, requiring then “that
SBM evaluations should address heterogeneity issues in a more rigorous and
systematic way in order to inform policymaking on best practices.” Access to limited
information about possible inequalities associated with the implementation of SBM
reforms (for instance the findings about differences in performance described in
Murnane, et al., 2006) clearly represents a challenge for policy makers, who must
then trust on the theoretical assumptions behind SBM (just like any school principal),
implement SBM reforms controlling as much as possible for factors associated with
the existence of inequalities, and then hope for the best. As expected, this situation is
not an ideal condition given that financial resources are scarce, and time constraints
exist.
Final comments
 The implementation of decentralization reforms like school-based
management has become a popular option in Latin America, in the search for
improving access in regions where centralized management of schools has proved to
be ineffective.
If conditions like low institutional capacity, the lack of a culture of participatory
planning, differences across schools, and the lack of clear rules for central
governments are ignored, SBM initiatives may likely deepen or reproduce
educational inequalities that policy designers might have been trying to address.
Furthermore, besides understanding the complexity of organizational cultures
at the school level, and how difficult it is to have an impact on instructional practices,
it is also necessary to understand if political cultures and deeply rooted institutions
within central educational systems may affect the implementation of SBM initiatives.
Implementing SBM programs in educational systems that are not used to living under
intensive participatory processes, increased concern for accountability, and school
autonomy, starting these programs may result in additional workload for principals,
frustration among school actors, simulation, lack of results, and wasting of resources.
Just like in any other educational intervention, several risks are associated to
the delegation of faculties, the promotion of participatory policies, and the
modification of governance structures. As the evidence described in this paper points
out, numerous challenges emerge when the number of actors involved in the
administration of schools increases. However, an optimistic perception exists about
the opportunity of improving the operation of any public education system, based on
the fact that policies like SBM remind us about the possibility of effectively supporting
schools.
As Richard Elmore (1993) suggests, in the debate about decentralization “a
central policy question should not be whether to centralize or decentralize authority,
but rather what should not be loosely controlled from any given level of government
and what should be tightly controlled”. Given the challenges observed in the
implementation of SBM interventions in Latin America, reproduction of educational
inequalities must certainly be included among the aspects to be tightly controlled by
central and local educational authorities, keeping in mind the myriad of practices and
innovations that could be observed in schools when they are adequately supported.
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